


It's not like I believe (in Everlasting Love)

by kcatdino



Series: It's not like I believe (in Everlasting Love) [1]
Category: The Vampire Diaries & Related Fandoms, The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: (probably), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bickering, Bickering as Flirting, Board Games, Chess, F/M, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, I like to think I'm funny, I swear it makes sense, Monopoly (Board Game), Werewolf Venom, but it's temporary, god I wish I could use the strip chess tag, klaus is cursed, mentions of The Originals plots, mentions of magical miracle babies, mild Damon bashing, mild Tyler bashing, set during college
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:08:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29833710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kcatdino/pseuds/kcatdino
Summary: Caroline unexpectedly bumps into Klaus on her winter break from college. They run into trouble, but it's not who you expect that ends up with a werewolf bite. And once the hallucinations set in, what truths will be revealed?Hurt/Comfort but with a side of board games
Relationships: Caroline Forbes/Klaus Mikaelson
Series: It's not like I believe (in Everlasting Love) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2182662
Comments: 3
Kudos: 21





	It's not like I believe (in Everlasting Love)

**Author's Note:**

> That time in the woods we all know about hasn’t happened yet, and Katherine isn’t close to dead. Basically, Season 5 occurred at a much slower pace, allowing everyone to actually attend class.

Caroline was having a pretty shitty winter break. Her friends were all busy sucking each other’s faces and her college beau, Jesse, had gone to his parents for the holidays. So here she was, walking alone towards the Falls, hoping the cold would keep any frisky couples away. In two smooth vampiric jumps, she reached the top of the falls and looked around, determined to savor each detail. When she completed the circle to face where she started, she jumped in surprise to see someone standing there.

Klaus.

She hadn’t seen him since graduation, when he beheaded several witches with a graduation cap for her and declared he’d be her ‘last love’. But there was something off with Klaus, who simply smiled sadly at her from a few feet away.

“You’d think you’d have better awareness of your surroundings, even for a baby vampire.”

“Please, I passed the year mark a while back, I have full control of my vampirism” she scoffed. “Besides, you’ve got a thousand years on me. You wouldn’t be a very effective nightmare for vampires if you couldn’t sneak up on someone as young as me.” She figures they are on a casual friendship level of conversation, at the very least, so she can ask her question. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing, sweetheart. It’s rude to interrupt a man while he’s brooding.”

She starts at the knowledge that he’d been here first, he usually seemed to follow her around. She covers it with snark. “Pretty sure I’ve never seen you brood without a glass of scotch before. Are you trying sobriety? After a thousand years as an alcoholic, it might be too late for you.” 

He barks out a laugh. “You're right, it’s likely too late for me in that regard. I just wanted to see the moon, unobstructed by the lights of civilization.” She glances up, she hadn’t realized it was full. “And the falls haven’t changed much in a thousand years.” So he was here to get lost in human memories, which seemed odd for him. She peered at him curiously, hoping the answer to his weird (well, weird for him) behavior would magically appear.

Klaus tenses suddenly and in a flash, she is whipped around behind him, something slamming into both of them. He cries out in pain, but manages to send the attacker flying over the falls, where Caroline catches a glimpse of fur.  _ Werewolf. _

Klaus turns around to face her, hands running over her sides to check for injuries. When she moves to open her mouth, he flashes them away from the falls, only to stumble twenty feet into the forest with a cry of pain, sending both of them tumbling to the ground.

“Klaus! Klaus! What’s wrong!” she frantically pleads, trying to keep her voice down in case there are more wolves out there.

“Werewolf venom.” He mutters, rubbing his arm where his shirt has been torn through.

She’s close to hysterics now. “Your blood is the freaking cure! Shouldn’t you be immune!”

He looks at her darkly. “It’s a long story.” 

“Well, hurry it up, because we need to get out here before more wolves show up.” She grabs his arm, intent on dragging him in the direction she believes the road lies, but he pulls them up short.

“And how do I know that wasn’t young Tyler who just attacked us?”

“Seriously?!?” She lets out a huff of frustration. “I honestly don’t know if it was him, we haven’t spoken in months. I dumped him.” She holds up a finger when he opens his mouth. “Don’t gloat. Let’s just get out of here.”

“Very well,” he nods, gripping her arm tightly and readjusting her course. Apparently she didn’t have as good a grasp on where the road was as she thought. “I don’t suppose you brought a car, love?”

“No, I walked from town.” She’s more than a little bewildered by what’s going on. Klaus should, under normal circumstances, be able to take on anyone who attacked them easily, but he was acting like hunted prey, his eyes shifting wildly back and forth. She would press for answers, but getting out of these potentially werewolf-infested woods was priority one. “What about you?”

“I left the car nearby. Assuming this wasn’t a planned attack, the tires won’t be slashed and we can get out of here.” They stumble into a clearing off the road, in sight of a pristine black SUV, thankfully with the tires intact. That’s when she realizes that he’s holding himself up by his grip on her arm, that he’s the reason they’ve been stumbling and staggering along. It makes her blood run cold.

“I’ll drive.” She holds her hands out for the keys and he eyes her warily. “For reasons I can’t comprehend, you are suffering the effects of werewolf venom. I’m not, therefore, I should be the one to drive.” He grudgingly hands the keys over. She tries to help him into the passenger seat and he growls at her, a single set of fangs on display instead of his usual double ones. She files that tidbit away to be considered at a later time, in a safer place, and starts the car. “We can go to my house.”

“We should go to mine, it’s still empty with most of the furniture in place” he argues, as trees fly by the car windows at her breakneck speed.

“No one alive lives there. If some hybrids you somehow didn’t kill are behind this, they won’t be able to get in without my mom’s permission.” Internally, she couldn’t believe she was glad Klaus was already invited into her house right now.

“Tyler has been invited in.” He points out calmly, before descending into a coughing fit, and god, why did he have to point that out now? 

“At least then we’ll know who we are dealing with.” And Tyler likely wouldn’t hurt Caroline, for all he intended to kill Klaus. Right?

They pull into Mystic Falls and are at her house in record time. Good thing her mom would be on shift overnight, she really didn’t want to explain this. She was equally thankful none of her mom’s deputies tried to give her a speeding ticket on her drive here.

She stomps into her house and points him to the living room, ire in every ounce of her being. She wanted answers now. “Start talking.” She folds her arms and gives her most menacing glare, the kind that worked on fellow cheerleaders and interfering teachers alike.

He chuckles fondly at her expression, before assuming a more serious tone. “Some of the witches in New Orleans thought to cripple me, limit my abilities to make me easier to control. Elijah’s dealing with them now.” He ends his statement flippantly, as if he himself couldn’t be bothered by all the fuss and had delegated it to his brother out of boredom.

“Yeah, I’m going to need a better explanation than that.” She keeps giving him the death glare.

He sighs, running a hand through his hair. “I’ve been stripped of my status as both hybrid and Original vampire. I suspect it’s only until the new moon, as the previous one was used to bind the spell. I may have been too hasty in tearing the hearts out of the witches who cast it, before they could provide adequate answers as to what exactly they did.”

She takes a moment to parse through everything he just said. One part seems the most important. “If you aren’t an original vampire right now, you could die from the venom.” Her voice is smaller than intended, it almost sounded like she was worried.

Klaus has the audacity to laugh at her. “The spell they cast wasn’t  _ that _ powerful sweetheart. I’ll be fine. Worst comes to worst, I suffer hallucinations for a few hours until it wears off."

“Fine, but if I think you’re dying I’m driving us both to campus and grabbing my emergency supply of your blood.”

“You really should keep that on you, love.” He said gravely, and she knew that dammit! But it wasn’t a long drive and she hadn't thought any werewolves were left in the area, so she’d left it in the mini fridge when she packed for break.

“I stopped paying attention to when the full moon was after I broke up with Tyler, ok? I shouldn’t have been out there tonight at all. You shouldn’t have either, in your current state.” He was looking a bit pale, and began a hacking cough at her words, leveling her with a half-hearted glare, opening his mouth to say something sure to annoy her. “Let me guess, don’t tell my friends you are here.”

“I believe that would be best, love.” He looks up at her from his spot on her mom’s couch, and she resists the urge to wrap a blanket around his form.

“Yeah, way ahead of you. They keep secrets all the time. I’ll be doing them a favor by keeping them from coming up with a mind-numbing plan to kill you that will surely fail.” She totally wasn’t giving into her anger that her friends had been keeping secrets, like Bonnie’s death, or everything surrounding Elena since Stefan came to town. 

“Undoubtedly. The elder Salvatore in particular’s plans tend to induce brain rot.”

“Yeah, Damon has never made a good plan in his life. I honestly don’t know how he’s survived this long.” Caroline sits down in the armchair across from Klaus, happy to badmouth Damon with someone who thought even worse of him than she did. 

“So how does this work?” He tilts his head to the side, not understanding her question. “I spent less than 24 hours with the venom in my system the times I got bit, but I know Damon made it three days before he was on death’s door. So what’s the timeline here for you to get over the venom?”

“Unclear. I’m still unsure exactly what the witches did to me, so we’ll have to estimate based on how quickly the hallucinations set in. I’ll make you a chart.” He grabs her notebook and a pencil from the side table and flips to an empty page.

“Wait seriously?” He looks at her in confusion. “You’ve seriously charted how long it takes for werewolf venom to affect a vampire?”

Klaus smirks at her. “Of course, love. Torture does get boring after a while, and I prefer to be precise in all my dealings with those I wish to survive.” He shrugs. “A little experimentation seemed fortuitous.”

“Huh” is all she can say as she sits back against the chair in shock. Sure, he wasn’t waxing poetic about torture techniques, she just hadn’t expected him to apply the same principles he did to art to his less charming practices. 

He's furiously applying the pencil to her notebook, presumably to graph out what they can expect from his predicament. He coughs straight onto the arm of the couch and she gets irritated. "Seriously? Cover your mouth when you cough."

He looks surprised, like he hadn't realized he'd been doing it. "Sorry, love. Out of practice. Haven't coughed much in a thousand years."

"Yeah, yeah, I'm helping an old as dirt vampire, tell me something I don't know."

"Hybrid" he mutters

"Not right now, you're not." She winces, he probably didn't deserve that jab. His eyes darken but he shrugs it off, flipping around the notepad to show her the finished graph.

"Keep this handy, and record the times of my symptoms." She studies the page he handed her, it was quite thorough based on her own experiences with the venom. He pulls the sheet down so he can look at her directly. "Why are you helping me, love?"

Her heart stutters and her words match. "I- I guess just because you need it." She steels up her resolve and puts on her best Caroline Forbes smile. "We should be friends, after everything, and I help my friends. Simple as that."

"Simple as that" he repeats, his usual smirk sliding firmly in place.

"Are you sure you don't want my dose of your blood? It won't take that long to get it from campus."

"No, love, save it for yourself. The night's not over and there could be more wolves out there. Besides, there’s a chance the spell rendered it moot."

She sighs, then visibly brightens at her next idea. "We should play board games! To pass the time until you're hallucinating! It'll almost be fun!"

He laughs. "Whatever you say, love. I'm killer at chess." 

She wrinkles her nose. "Gross. Let me see what else we have." She bends to look through the board game cabinet in the corner of the room. God, most of these games hadn't been touched since she, Bonnie, and Elena had sleepovers before all the supernatural nonsense started. 

"Monopoly! The game almost as old as you." She pulls the game from the cabinet triumphantly. 

Klaus grumbles "it's more of an age with the Salvatores. Chess is, what's the phrase? More my speed. You've got the right mindset to excel at such a strategy game." He leans forward, studying her intently with a sly smile on his face and nope, she needs to nip that in the bud.

"Well, I think chess is boring, and I don't know it well enough to tell when you start messing up from the venom, so monopoly it is."

"Whatever you say, love." That's the second time he's said that. It makes her wonder if he's messing with her. She eyes him critically, then glances at his carefully drawn up chart again. They have plenty of time before it hits him hard, even in the worst case scenario. So she reluctantly sighs and grabs the chess board as well. 

"You have one hour." She warns him sternly. "One hour to convince me chess isn't boring. And then we are playing monopoly."

He spends the next couple minutes trying to teach her to play chess the way he learned, but she knew enough to argue back. Caroline insisted on looking up tournament rules and playing the modern variation, much to Klaus's chagrin.

"I want to be able to play against people who aren't a thousand years old after this, Klaus" she complained, and the idea that she'd be taking what she learned with her was enough to shut him up. He helpfully pointed out when she was in danger of making a mistake, sometimes in less than helpful ways, smirking at her. On their third game she thought she was giving him a run for his money, until finding herself in surprise checkmate.

Groaning, she glanced at the clock and froze. It had been well over an hour since they'd started playing. "You tricked me." Klaus plasters on his best innocent face. It wasn't very good. "I was promised monopoly." 

"I don't recall agreeing to your terms sweetheart." The bastard has the audacity to smirk at her and she wants to flip the board over on him. Rather than give into her baser instincts, she tells him to box the chessboard up while she gets out monopoly. 

"What's this?" He leans over and plucks a long black box from the board game cabinet. He studies it with a thoughtfulness she can't help but laugh at when she sees what's in his hands. "The party game for horrible people. By your own admission, the game seems perfect for me, love."

"Nope, no way I am playing Cards Against Humanity with you. That game should never be played sober." 

"Isn't that a problem that can be easily rectified?"

"Klaus! You could be dying! We are not raiding my mom's liquor cabinet."

"Very well, monopoly it is."

He was looking rather pale, now that she studied him. There was a fine sheen of sweat on his face, but he was joking around like normal, so that was somewhat reassuring. She jots down the sweat in the column next to the chart he drew her, recording the time.

"Ready to get your butt whooped in Monopoly?"

  
  


The dice weren't in Klaus's favor and she was handedly beating him in monopoly. Caroline was doing a better job of checking the clock, as well as studying him for changes in symptoms, but so far there weren't any.

"Some nurse you are," he groaned as she made him pay up for landing on her third hotel in a row, "aren't they supposed to be nice to their patients?"

"Hey, you're not a patient and I'm not your nurse." She points at him menacingly. "All's fair in love and monopoly."

"That's not what the bard wrote, sweetheart."

"Yeah, yeah, you know from experience. You're just upset you're losing so horribly."

"I've just had bad dice rolls" he grumbles, but something clicks in her mind and she shoves the back of her hand against his forehead. "This isn't the kind of contact I'd hoped for love" he smirks at her, though the effect is ruined by the sweat coming off on her hand.

"Shut up, I'm checking for a fever. We had a thermometer, but I tried it on myself once and it broke." She sits back, wiping her hand off and grabbing the pencil to make the chart. "You've had a fever for at least an hour, that's why all your strategies have been horrible."

"Come now love, give yourself some credit." She just glares at him. "Alright, I noticed a bit of fogginess starting 30 minutes ago. I didn't want to alarm you."

"Klaus! The chart!" She shakes it angrily at him. "What's the point of this super useful chart if you aren't going to be honest about your symptoms?"

"Sorry, love. Would you accept it if I blamed the fever?"

She leans back with a pout. "Maybe."

"Come now, you still need to beat me in monopoly." He gestures toward the board and they resume their game. Caroline makes it twice around Go and racks up a large amount of Klaus's cash reserves before he starts muttering. It's not in English or French or any language Caroline can recognize; his words sound… older.

"Klaus?" He sits upright and looks past her, fear in his eyes. She whips around, expecting a werewolf to have broken in, but the hallway behind her is empty. Klaus however, has begun shouting in that old language, gesturing wildly. 

The hallucinations have started.

He flashes past her, shoving her down and out of the way of the imaginary threat. One word in English breaks through, "run" and her blood chills. But she makes a big show of checking the house for intruders, before shoving him back onto the couch. He goes easily and lets her wrap a blanket around him. He's too docile, it worries her. Though not as much as the fear in his eyes. He leans into her form and she lets herself be pulled down to sit beside him.

A few jagged breaths later, and Klaus seems to be in control of himself again. "Sorry about that sweetheart."

"What did you see?" He stays silent, face turned away, breathing heavily. She nudges her shoulder against his. "Can you at least tell me what language that was?"

He sighs, running his hands through his hair as he turns to face her. "Old Norse. The language of my childhood."

"Oh." She hadn't expected his hallucinations to be something from his human life. Surely the things you ran into after a thousand years of life were much scarier? "Maybe you should lay down, try and sleep through it."

"Whatever you say, nurse." He smirks up at her with bloodshot eyes and she playfully smacks him. He rubs the shoulder she hit. "You're a terrible medical professional."

"That's because I'm not one" she sing-songs, getting up and leaving him on the couch. Filling in the chart with his new symptoms, she sighs. It appears he won't be getting the quick version of venom poisoning, that he was right and the witches might have somehow stripped him of Original vampire status. Still, no need to alarm him. Yet.

He sleeps fitfully and she keeps searching the house for more blankets to pile on top of him. Surely it worked like a fever, and sweating it out would help? Caroline eyes her car keys more than once, debating whether she could get his blood from her dorm before he woke back up. The only thing stopping her was the knowledge that her mom might come home early, and vampires suffering werewolf bites were liable to try and make snacks out of friendly humans. 

She returns from a foray into the kitchen for cocoa to find Klaus muttering in his mother tongue again. He flinches when she enters, muttering the same name over and over again.  _ Mikael. _ Caroline suddenly felt like what she was witnessing was very private, not meant for her eyes. Because it sounded like Klaus’s father was a nightmare for him when they were all humans, in addition to hunting him over the centuries.

“Hey,” she says softy, placing a hand on his shoulder through the blankets. “I brought hot chocolate.” His eyes find hers and the terror in them gradually gives way to awareness. He sits up slowly, taking the mug from her with thanks.

“How long was I out?” He asks once he’s gotten his strength back up.

She shrugs. “A few hours. I’ve been keeping watch for any werewolves, but so far no one has come near the house.”

“I shouldn’t have asked this of you, Caroline.” His voice is dead serious, a kind of anguish breaking through the edges of it.

“What are friends for?” She shrugs again, and goes to leave the room, when he catches her arm.

“I cannot thank you enough.” His voice is just above a whisper, like he’s not used to saying the words.

Caroline doesn’t want to look too deeply into his words just now, so covers with humor. “Wow, seems like the hallucinations are making you polite. Should I record it in your symptoms?” 

Klaus looks affronted. “I’m always polite sweetheart, even when I’m not particularly nice.”

“Yeah, true enough.” She fidgets her hands. “We’ve only got a few hours before my mom comes home. It’s not that she can’t know you’re here….”

He’s nodding even before she finishes speaking. “You don’t want to risk a feverish vampire around your very human mother. I understand, love. Once dawn breaks, it should be safe enough to drop me off at my manor near town.”

“Klaus! I’m not leaving you!” He looks genuinely surprised at her outburst and too curious for her good. “Besides, I think we have a problem.” She shoves the chart with all her notes of his symptoms in his face. “You aren’t recovering as quickly as you should be. If you aren’t an Original right now….”

“On the contrary love, I seem to be following the same pattern Elijah did during his last bout with werewolf venom. So I’m on track to make a full, miraculous recovery in about 6 hours.” He coughs at the end, which doesn’t reassure her. She takes the notes back from him.

“What have you guys been up to that Elijah’s been bit by werewolves?” A look flashes across Klaus’s face. She knew that look. “Did you seriously bite your brother?”

Klaus stiffens. “He made some outrageous accusations regarding my intentions for my unborn child. I  _ may  _ have lost my temper.”

She snorts. “That’s putting it mildly.” Something else he said is slower to catch up to her brain. “So Tyler was telling the truth. You’re about to be a dad.”

“Caroline…” he starts, looking pained.

“Don’t give me that. You don’t owe me anything, and I don’t owe you anything.” He looks like he wants to argue, but bites it back at the last moment. “Of all the people a magical miracle baby has to happen to, why is it you?” She tears at her hair. “You don’t even want kids! There are plenty of vampires in the world who would kill, quite literally, for the ability to have kids!”

“Caroline….” he interrupts her rant, which had been increasing in volume as she paced. “You wanted kids, didn’t you.”

“Well, not now.” She flounces down on the seat cushions again. “I had my whole life planned out at one point. Husband. Job. House. Kids. I had planned on having them around thirty. Wrote it in my planner and everything.”

“And now you’re wondering why you haven’t been afforded the same miracles” he replied grimly.

She sighs, looking at him intently. “Klaus, I’m not ready for kids, even if I could have them.  _ You _ aren’t ready for a kid, despite being a thousand years old. I can’t decide if that’s encouraging for the rest of us or not.”

He coughs and wraps the blanket tighter around his body. “You can always adopt, you know. I’ve done it once or twice. It’s easier if the child is old enough to understand your nature and keep it a secret.”

“You’ve been a dad before?” The news startles her, Klaus didn’t seem like the type.

“Rebekah, Elijah and I raised Marcel, who stole my throne out from under me and is now engaging me in a battle for the city. So I would say parenthood is a mixed bag, so far.”

He seems shaky again. “You should try and get some more sleep. I’m moving you in a few hours. Would be great if you didn’t hallucinate while I was driving.”

“We can only hope.”

  
  


Klaus makes it another couple hours without a noteworthy incident. He mostly mutters in languages she doesn’t know, though she does perk up when she hears a single name,  _ Tatia, _ which definitely belonged to a former love, the way he sighed over the name. Caroline amuses herself playing a chess app on her laptop and imagining her friends' faces should she tell them who was sleeping on her couch this weekend. It would be pretty funny to see Elena and Damon stutter, but the betrayal on Stefan’s face in her mind gives her pause. It was bad enough to see that look on Tyler’s face, and she had long since decided he wasn’t worth the effort. 

Her ex-boyfriend's nemesis stirs on the couch, before gesturing wildly and shouting in French. At least she knew some of the language this time. Klaus throws the blankets off of himself and attempts to vamp speed out of the room, only to crash into the wall beside the door. She winces as she jumps up, it’s likely they’ll have to replace the drywall.

“Klaus, Klaus! Calm down!” She tries to help him extricate himself from the wall, but he shrugs her off, muttering what sounded like a slur in French. Ignoring his insult, (she was pretty sure his addled mind just called her a whore), she tries soothing tones as he shakes the wall out of his hair.

“Mikael.” Klaus didn’t sound afraid like he had in his previous visions, he sounded livid. “You won’t take him!” he shouted in English. “Give us back Marcel and I might let you live.” Klaus’s fury quickly turned to near sobs. “Marcel” he repeated the name over and over. His eyes were wild, and Caroline comes up to him, cupping his face in her hands, trying to soothe back his hair as she brushes the drywall from it.

“It’s ok, it’s ok. He’s fine. You guys hate each other now. So it’s the regular state of affairs for the Mikaelson’s.” She attempts a joke at the end, but it falls flat even to her ears. His face still looks so heartbroken, and she’s holding him so softly, she just leans in and doesn’t think for a moment. She brushes a single kiss lightly against his lips, hoping it will wake him from his nightmare.

“Caroline…?” Klaus blinks away his confusion, clearly confused by their embrace.

“Oh good, you’re awake!” She steps back quickly and covers her embarrassment with her usual chipperness. “I need you to get in the car, I’m taking you to Mikaelson manor. Dawn’s broken and my mom will be home soon.”

“Of course love, lead away.” Caroline is grateful he let her change the subject, even if it was awkwardly done.

They drive to the old mansion in silence. Klaus had refused her attempts to keep him wrapped in a blanket, and he was now shivering slightly in the passenger seat. When Caroline throws open the doors, they both immediately cough at the level of dust that has accumulated.

“Wow, you couldn’t spring for a cleaner?” She jokes once the dust has settled and she’s thrown a cover off the nearest couch.

Klaus grabs a blanket out of the cupboard “I wasn’t planning on coming back to town.” He must see the hurt that flashes on her face before she can mask it. “Caroline…”

“I said we don’t owe each other anything, and I meant it.” She tells him firmly. “Now lay down and try to sleep, I’m going to scrounge for breakfast. In the very least a mug so I can make the hot chocolate I brought.” She spends more time in the kitchen than she needed too, it felt very odd being in their house with Klaus after all this time. It’s only when she hears a crash from the living room that she runs to Klaus’s side.

“Sorry, love. I fell asleep in the wrong position, woke up on the floor. ” He looks at her hands, which are covered in cocoa from her flight to the kitchen. “Are you alright?”

She grabs a towel and hurriedly cleans herself off. “How did you fall while sleeping?”

“I must admit I’m out of practice. I think I’ve slept more tonight than I have in decades, as restless as it has been.” He gingerly wrapped the blanket around himself and eyed the couch warily before settling on it.

“Yeah I guess you lose human customs along with your morals over the centuries.” She winces, he probably didn’t deserve that. At least not from her. Particularly not while suffering what a werewolf bite, which she knew the pain of all too well.

He seemed to follow her train of thought. “I truly regret having bit you love.”

“Yeah, right.”

He leans forward the best he can, encumbered by the blankets as he is, to stare directly in her eyes. “I am sorry I hurt you Caroline, the circumstances surrounding it aside.”

“And do you regret ordering Tyler to bite me?”

“Well, I wouldn’t go that far, I might not have met you otherwise.”

“Asshole” She says laughing, hitting him on the arm, accidentally on his bite and he grimaces from pain.

She goes to apologize and he cuts her off. “I likely deserved that, I’ll consider it your revenge, assuming you don’t have more in store for me.”

“You never know, night’s still young.” She teases then frowns. “Though I guess it’s technically morning.”

“Yes, the sunlight interrupting my attempts at sleep seem to make that likely.”

She goes to return to the kitchen, calling out “Do you want any hot chocolate? Or did you give up human food along with sleep?”

“I’ll take whatever you give me” he calls in response and she pauses her cocoa machinations. He sounded like he was feeling better, if he was flirting like normal. They should probably talk about when she kissed him, though it could likely wait until he was fully recovered. No need to have an uncomfortable conversation if there’s a chance he wouldn’t remember it. She brings them both hot cocoa and digs her notebook out of her bag, so she can record his recovery in the notes.

They sit in companionable silence for a while, both sipping on their cocoa. The silence begins to bother her after a while though, and she decides some light teasing is in order. “So who’s Tatia?”

Klaus grimaces. “The first Petrova doppelganger I made the acquaintance of.”

“Yeah, you two sounded real acquainted.” She snorts into her cocoa.

“Elijah and I both dated her at the same time, so my mother used her as spell food when she turned us into vampires.”

It’s Caroline’s turn to grimace. “Why are so many people obsessed with dating that face? I love Elena, but it’s got to be exhausting on her end as well.”

“I couldn’t agree more. There were limited options in our small village, and I suspect part of the doppelganger magic is their …. allure. Elijah seems to have an eternal weakness for them, though I must say I’ve avoided their charms since.” 

Klaus had been returning to his normal coloring and seemed less sweat-soaked during their talk. He smirks at her and she can already tell she isn’t going to like what he has to say. “Caroline, why did you kiss me?”

“What??” She sputters, hoping to deflect.

Klaus leans forward intently. “Earlier, at your house. When I thought Mikael was killing Marcel all over again. You kissed me and it brought me out of the hallucinations.”

“That’s why I did it, ok? I wanted to ground you in reality.”

“And you decided a kiss was the way to do it?” He was enjoying making her squirm way too much.

“Well it worked, didn’t it?” she snapped at him, and hurriedly collected their empty mugs, intending to return them to the kitchen. He grabs her arm as she moves to pass him, attempting to make himself appear more dignified than he does while wrapped in a blanket. “I do still intend to be your last love.”

“Klaus,” She sighs, how is she going to put this? “It’s not like I believe in everlasting love.” He starts in surprise. “I don’t care about any ghosts who broke your heart before we met, I don’t even care about the ghosts that you put in the ground. I’m nineteen, vampire or not I don’t have a concept of time that stretches out that long. I didn’t grow up with any couples that stayed together until they were old, they either separated like my parents or died young like Elena’s. And honestly, I was under the impression you thought of love as a weakness.” 

She gently removes his hand from her arm, placing it back on the couch. “I’m glad you’re feeling better,” she says softly, before exiting the room. Her hands are shaking as she cleans the mugs in the sink, where had that speech come from? She doesn’t even notice Klaus enter the kitchen, jumping in surprise when she turns to see him standing in the doorway.

“You were right, I am feeling better.” He smiles his wolfish grin. “In fact, I’d say I’m fully recovered, all thanks to your care, nurse Caroline.” He certainly looked like he was feeling better, in fact, he looked just as attractive as she’d even seen him, even with the rumpled hair and clothes.

She doesn't even argue the nurse title, drinking him in as she is. He startles her by speaking again, too soon for her brain to catch up. "I am in your debt, Caroline. And I abhor being indebted to anyone. So what shall it be?"

"What?" She sputters out.

"What do you want in return for your help? To leave Mystic Falls alone, to perhaps spare your newly human roommate Katherine? The promise of Rome and Paris, without my presence?"

She simply stares at him a moment, ears not comprehending what he's saying. Once she's caught up though, she's angry. "Goddammit, can't you let someone do something nice for you?" She slams the mug down too hard on the marble countertop and hears a distinct cracking sound, but she refuses to look to see what’s broken. "Friends are nice to each other without expecting anything in return."

"Then, to solidify our new  _ friendship _ " he smirks at the word, "I'll swear to leave all your little friends in peace. What's the saying? A friend of my friend is… spared horrifying deaths?"

She won't laugh, Caroline tells herself. She bites her inner cheek to keep from giggling. Suddenly, an idea hits her. If Klaus is going to be annoying about their friendship, surely she can get something else she wants out of it? 

"There's this study abroad program I was looking at…"

He cocks his head. "Oh? Anywhere interesting?"

Caroline draws herself upright. "Florence, I'll have you know. I could use a little help, from a  _ friend _ to pay for the trip this summer. And you know, if said  _ friend  _ wanted to drop by for a weekend, show me any nearby cities, that would be ok too." Klaus's smirk slowly stretched into a genuine smile at her words.

He takes her hand and brushes his lips against her knuckles. "What sort of friend would I be to refuse?"

**Author's Note:**

> Rome is a short train ride from Florence. Bum bum BUM.
> 
> Also, I am definitely not writing a crack fic featuring Klaroline playing cards against humanity right now.....


End file.
